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Hertz Shelby Mustang - The Original


Spiny

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Guess I'd better declare mine here - seems that there's quite a few of these about so I'll leave out the box contents, but just to be clear this is the kit in question.

 

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Because I tend to build at a pace similar to a snail on spice this will be done straight out of the box. And as my first car build on returning to the hobby was the 2006 version, I absolutely have to build it in black with gold stripes to resemble it's cousin from four years ago (looking at the picture now I realise how much neater my more recent builds are under the camera!):

 

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But first, a small confession. Although I haven't started building anything yet, I have got some paint on the body as I tend to leave a couple of weeks between coats and could see that holding me up. It's just had the colour coat (pics at some stage over the weekend) so still decalling and clear coats to go. Hope that is ok as there is well under 25% of work done to date, but it's not a completely fresh build from 10th July.

 

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***REPETITIVE PHOTO ALERT***

 

Having mentioned that I had started on the paint earlier, I guess it's only right that I should go through that process now that the group build has started. There is logic behind all thr shots in primer I promise, shame I didn't think to take a pic of it pre-priming but can't be helped.

 

First step was to spray the body with a guide coat so I could see any mould lines, sink marks etc. better than on bare plastic. Unfortunately, the photo doesn't really show them either, although it did make it easier to see in real life.

 

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Fortunately, on this kit the mould lines are in places which are quite easy to deal with and a light sanding along the tops of the front and rear wings, and a bit heavier sanding along the tops of the doors dealt with most of them. The worst bit seems to be around the headlights which look as though there has been some work done to the mould over the years, I've done filling and sanding here as well as sanding down the sills which were quite messy towards the rear, particularly on the left hand side. The other main patches are where I cut and sanded off the badges - although I like the look of them they shouldn't be on this car. Fortunately, once I'd scraped the main part of the badges off with a #17 blade they weren't too difficult to sand smooth. The final job was to get out the scriber and deepen the panel lines - as this is a black car there won't be any wash going in so I wanted them to be noticeable and the depth of the lines is somewhat inconsistent, you can tell this dates back to 1985.

 

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After that it got the proper coat of primer. If you're observant, you can see there are still sink marks near the headlights - after this photo they were filled, sanded and the front of the car given another coat of primer. I've had the copyright text reappear on cars before when I've primed, so it was a relief that the badges seem to have gone.

 

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After that, it was onto the colour coat. I was quite pleased with how this had gone on (the orange peel wasn't as bad as the photo makes it look), but then noticed that the pain was a bit thin on the underside of the sills.

 

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So today I decided to give it another coat giving it a good spray from underneath. The result is a duller finish, but with less orange peel. Not a disaster though as I'm going to give it a clear coat after the decals anyway. No picture of it as it stands - next week I hope to start decalling it so it will be seen then, but the pic above isn't far off how it stands now.

 

Thanks for looking.

 

 

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Didn't get on here yesterday for fairly obvious (footballing!) reasons, but I got the build out of the blocks over the weekend.

 

Like John, I couldn't be doing with a chrome sump, so those parts went into the bleach over the weekend along with the alternator (who has a chromed alternator 😕 ???) I did leave the carburettor chromed though as I figured that was something which may stay that way, and besides which I missed it! And it will probably be hidden underneath the air filter when finished. The engine halves were glued together, then separated as I realised I'd misaligned them, before finally being reglued again. A bit of sanding down got it looking something like ok, although a bit of texture has gone missing. Still got to finish painting the aluminium and the header blocks but the smaller pieces are done. All the smaller pieces in the pic are 'done'now, still deciding whether to add a bit of wash to the engine or treat it as a new, or show, car after a steam clean.

 

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One thing about this build which is going to help is that it appears to have a large number of sub-assemblies rather than relying on you adding various bits to one big lump. That will mean that if I get a mulit-colour part, there's a good chance I won't be delayed for weeks on end while I get it painted and instead can move on with other bits.

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19 hours ago, Spiny said:

The engine halves were glued together, then separated as I realised I'd misaligned them

 

I did exactly the same last night with mine.  Luckily I spotted it before the glue had fully cured.  Was the gearbox output end misaligned by any chance?

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That's the one. Like you I noticed before the glue had fully dried so was able to prise the two halves apart down as far as the bell housing. Then, more glue, and a rather too complicated arrangement with reverse angle tweezers got things back in line so hopefully it will be ok now.

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A little more progress this weekend. Most time consuming of all was the body. First of all I had to flat back the worst of the orange peel. I know it hasn't all gone yet but that won't matter as I plan to clear coat once ready. I was thinking of using the Humbrol clear I have on order, but it turns out that I have a can and a half of the Revell Clear left. As that paint worked ok on the 2006 Mustang's stripes, I figure it should be ok with these 🤞Having got rid of the worst with some 2000 grit sandpaper, I gave it a quick run over with some 6000 grit Micromesh - it gives it a sheen which wouldn't doo for the finished model but should be fine for adding decals. After that, it was a case of gluing on the side scoops and rear valance. I'm going to leave the front valance until after the chassis has gone in as that should make assembly easier, and also the front valance doesn't seem to fit as nicely so I'm not sure the joint strength would be enough to survive the joining of chassis and body.

 

And then it was time to start the decalling. I've still got quite a few to fit, but I think I've managed to get the hardest few on - both bonnet decals plus the one of the scuttle louvres and one of the side stripes.

 

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I know there's a couple of small wrinkles around the edge of the bonnet scoop, but as @TonyW said in his warning post, the decals go on looking quite wrinkly then settle down as they dry. I found that they settled very well into the louvres and around the scoop by applying Micromesh before laying the decal down, then using a wet finger to keep plenty of water around the decal while it was set in position. So far those wrinkles are the worst issue I have so I'm hopeful for the next ones which should be much flatter. I've given the wrinkled bit a run over with MicroSol but it doesn't seem to have done much so far.

 

The other job was a return to the engine. All those bits above (with the exception of the starter motor) have been put together now so it's starting to look like an engine. Like @johnlambert I can't be doing with that open topped oil pan, so have also gone down the route of adding styrene card and filler to get a top on. It's not as neat as John's, but given I expect it to be barely (if at all) visible I will live with it. It needs a second coat of paint, but should get attached to the engine next week (this is what's holding up fitting the starter motor). So this is how the engine is looking at the moment:

 

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Probably the most obvious thing about the engine is going to be the cam covers, which are chrome pieces which require some very fine painting. I decided to keep the chrome, but then watered down some Revell 302 Satin Black to the consistency of a wash, ran the paint into the grooves and the Cobra text surround, left for 5 minutes then lightly rubbed with a piece of old T-shirt to remove the paint from the highpoints. After 3 goes of this, this is the end result.

 

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Obviously I still need to add the black surround for the edges of the cam covers but this should give an idea of how it's gone.

 

Fingers crossed next week I can get the engine finished. Thanks for looking.

 

 

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To be honest, with the bonnet stripes I was resigned to them ending up looking wrinkled and needing to press the wrinkles down enough to clear coat over them. Then I came back a couple of hours later and they'd settled down really nicely - don't know that I did anything special so maybe just got lucky.

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Time for this week's update, and catching up with friends today meant that it's a bit shorter this week.

 

First of all, the obvious one - decals. Almost all the gold stripes are on now, just the roof to add. And apart from the valances they've all behaved surprisingly well. At the moment the rear valance decal is coated in Microsol to try to encourage it to sink into the number plate recess. It didn't want to go into there with just the Microset and water but I'm hoping that with this or one more application of the Microsol it will sink down right - it certainly seems to be behaving better than the Belkits decals of this time last year. The front valance decal also wasn't keen on sinking into place, but unfortunately without me noticing this one didn't go on centralised. Fortunately most of it will be hidden by the numberplate in the end, and the shot below makes it seem worse as the cocktail stick is offset the other way. I don't think moving it is an option though - it's fully settled in now and any attempt to move it is likely to damage it.

 

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Meanwhile, a little more progress with the engine. The oil pan has been finished and fitted to the engine now along with the starter, while the belt assembly is also painted up and the alternator added. This and the fan just need gluing in place now. Meanwhile, the exhaust manifolds are painted in steel, but I want to add blue paint onto the runner where they fit onto the block before gluing in place. And those cam covers are also nearly done, just one more coat of black to the end currently in tweezers and they will go on too. With paint started on the front suspension/subframe and the exhaust pipes I'm hopeful that better progress will be made next week.

 

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Nothing really interesting in terms of techniques here, it's just been cleaning up the parts, painting and gluing with no major headaches.

 

Thanks for looking.

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Time for an update on this weekend's work, and the first thing to report is that the last of the stripy decals is in place. Now all I have to do is brave the clear-coating process... I've also included a pic of the underside of the chassis since that's the next step. I know it's meant to be done in anthracite rather than matt black, but I've only got the anthracite in brush paint rather than a spray can, and besides that I think black looks close enough. As the photo shows, I've also got the fuel tank painted along with the brake cables - after I took the shot I realised that the sender cable from the fuel tank also needed painting so this has been done now too.

 

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The next bit of good news is that with the cam covers and exhausts added I got the engine completed. Not sure if it's right, but I decided it would look better if the fixing plate was in the same blue as the engine rather than the 'steel' colour of the exhaust. It certainly makes it look neater (in my opinion) anyway. Speaking of the cam covers, I'm quite pleased with how these have turned out - first time I've tried a wash with watered down paint and it went surprisingly smoothly, if a little bit of a slow process building up the layers to get a reasonably solid black.

 

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The other main bit of work was to the suspension. As the photo below shows, I got the front suspension painted up and fitted it without too much trouble. The exhausts have also been painted, but I haven't got around to fitting them yet, while the rear suspension is still in the process of being painted. I may have to redrill the holes for the fixing points for the exhaust (at least) but there's nothing complicated here.

 

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Finally I made a start on the interior, or rather a start on the steering wheel. For some reason (which I soon regretted) I decided to drill out the holes in the steering wheel. With four holes in each spoke this became a bit of a long-winded process, and then they needed cleaning up and redrilling a few times to get rid of debris which blocked them. After all that I'm not really sure that they add a lot - feels like a lot of effort for something which doesn't look a whole lot better than it would with the moulded in hollows. After drilling it had a coat of silver paint to reduce the chance of white showing through, then a brush coat of Molotow Chrome.

 

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And that's where I've got up to. Thanks for looking.

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Good progress! Technically speaking, in a pushrod-operated OHV engine like all the traditional US V-8:s are, they are not called cam covers, but rocker or valve covers. The cam is hidden in the block, under the intake manifold :winkgrin:

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10 hours ago, Six97s said:

There is usually a flange on tubular headers, but in model kits it's often rendered much too thick and/or as a simple rectangle, so in lieu of thinning and reshaping it, there's argument for some creative painting.  :)

 

The real thing for reference:  https://shelbypartsstore.com/?product=product-3

 

Blame some flawed thinking there - I didn't think of looking for the manifold itself and instead just looked for the engine. And as they all seemed to be buried deep in the engine bay I couldn't decide whether there was an individual flange on each part, or one continuous flange as in the kit. Looks as though I chose wrong - now I have to balance the risk of painting the front of the flange and potentially messing something else up due to confined working space against the reward of having it look more like the real thing. Something for me to think about before Saturday....

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23 hours ago, TonyW said:

I think the cylinder heads should angle over far enough to disguise the headder flanges from view. Once the block is fitted into the engine bay things will look perfectly OK.

I had a look tonight and think you're absolutely right about that - the flanges will be almost invisible from either above or below so will only be noticeable to someone who is actively looking for them (i.e. me!). Of course, if I'd stopped to think, the fact that there don't seem to be any good pictures of the exhaust manifolds, let alone the flanges, in position should have given me a clue that they would be well hidden when finished...

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Despite the poor weather (I really want to get a clearcoat down on this one, but it seems that every weekend is a wet weekend at the moment) I did manage to make some progress this weekend. Or at least I got a bit of time spent on the Mustang.

 

First job was a simple one, finishing painting on the rear suspension and getting that and the exhaust in place. Apart from having to redrill the holes (paint had narrowed them down a bit) there's not really a lot to say about this. The same is true for fitting the engine, the hardest bit was holding the engine and chassis bits of the exhaust together while the glue dried. So I'll just show a couple of photos instead.

 

Underneath:

 

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And the engine in place:

 

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After that it's onto the dashboard, which always takes ages and this one looks like being no exception. Unfortunately I mixed the 'J' Type paint a bit thin, so had to strip and restart the paint on the dash which has put me back a bit. I did however get the steering wheel finished, Molotow chrome on the middle from last week and then the recommended brown for the rim. Then I decided to go over that brown with some Tamiya Smoke - not sure if that was a good idea as it is quite dark now, but it has at least given a bit more character than just a plain brown rim. Careful painting of the silver studs has completed this item. (Actually, looking at the photo it hasn't completed it as I've just noticed there's still a decal to fit to the wheel boss).

 

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That took a fair bit of time, and so did the dials. The black surround to the dash was done in the same way as the rocker covers - i.e. a very watered down stain black paint flowed into the recess and built up over a number of layers. Then I started added the decals. For all those of you who are doing the Hertz Mustang, the speedometer decal is too small for the recess on the part. That left two options, paint the dial black then add the decal, or use the relief on the part. I chose the section option and spent a good part of today adding washes to the speedo, before painting the needle. Hopefully the smaller dial decals will sit down a bit when I add Microsol, but this is how it looks now. Got to admit that looking at the super-close-up photo there is a part of me wishing I'd done the same on the other dials for consistency, but I'm sure it will be virtuall invisible when the car is finished. Assuming no further mishaps, the only extra thing I plan to do with this is to add some clear resin over the speedo to give a smooth front to it.

 

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Thanks for looking.

 

 

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14 hours ago, TonyW said:

That dash looks amazing. 

 

Credit for that speedo goes to whoever at Revell created the mould - that numbering is incredibly sharp for something so small and chrome plated. Having looked at that pic of the dials, I think next time I come across a set of dials which have moulded in figures I'm going to go with the watered down paint technique again rather than using the decals. Not sure what (if anything) in my stash has that so it may take some time, but at least now I know that the technique works.

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Thanks. The speedo is actually suprisingly easy - satin black thinned down to the consistency of a wash, then spread that over the speedo. Wait about 5 minutes until it's lost its wetness, then wrap a piece of old t-shirt around the end of a bradawl (or similar) and rub off the paint on top of the numbering before it dries fully. Repeat once fully dry until you have a solid black background. Then the fiddly bit - using a fine brush carefully paint the needly red.

 

This morning it got covered in clear infra-red resin to it looks as though it has glass on it. Happily that seems to have worked fairly well.

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As usual working on the dashboard has slowed this build to a crawl. I obviously mixed the 'Type J' paint a bit thin as it took 4 coats to get good coverage but I finally managed it. Today it was on with some detailing of the gloss black and silver so the dash piece is finally finished, just got to add the mustang decal before I stick it all together. So here's all the pieces which need sticking, plus the gear lever which is also done now. I stripped the chrome off that so the chrome you see on it is from the Molotow pen which was left for a week before I started adding other paint.

 

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Seeing as the dashboard was holding me up I decided to get on with painting the interior seeing as this is a somewhat time limited build. It has been sprayed with Halfords Satin black previously, then the interior masked off and the outside sprayed with Halfords Matt Black. Then just a case of giving it an anthracite carpet, brush painting the chrome trim and window winders with Molotow chrome (I realise this post is beginning to sound like an advert for the stuff!) and then painting the pedals. No glue yet (in fact apart from gluing the seats together no gluing at all this weekend), but it's quite a large part to get sorted.

 

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But the biggest news this weekend is that Mr. Sun finally came out to play so I was able to get some clear on the body. Bearing in mind the issues Tony W and Fnick have both had recently, I went at this really carefully even though I used Revell Clear Gloss which is relatively gentle on decals. So two light mist coats (three on the main body), then heavier mist coat to get full coverage, then a light wet coat before finally the full wet coat to get what was meant to be a half decent finish, But as many others have done as well I managed to get a load of orange peel on the top of the body (probably not enough paint on the final layer) although I think I can probably polish that back. The sides have come out pretty well so I'd prefer not to be adding more paint to the body if I can avoid it. That not enough paint was probably brought about becuase yesterday I put too much paint on the bonnet and got a run which will need dealing with once its cured enough to sand back, probably a further wet coat afterwards too to get things workable again. But on the bright side the decals appear to have survived :)

 

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And that's all for this week. Thanks for looking.

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